A delegation of Chinese officials led by Vice-Premier Ma Kai [pictured below] will today visit the company headquarters of Keelings Fruit in North County Dublin, Ireland.
Keelings is one of Ireland's best known suppliers of fruits and vegetables, and today's visit comes on foot of the company's recent expansion into the Chinese market.
CEO of the company, Caroline Keeling, explained to RTE Radio's 'Morning Ireland' programme that the 21 delegates are "mainly coming to see our software system."
Keelings' recent expansion into the Chinese market has come through licensing software which will be used by fruit companies similar to their own, as well as supplying China with fresh produce.
In 1988, Keelings created their very own software system to help manage their business, because of the poor market offering for such a product. Over the years this software system developed further and in 2011, the decision was made to market it to other companies. As successful trial of the software in Holland led to interest from a number of Chinese companies.
"We had six people in the software company when we first set it up as a company, and now we have 23. So it's certainly growing," said Caroline.
"Equally they want to look around our facilities and see how we make our fruit."
A marketing strategy which has proved extremely successful for the company over in Hong Kong this year was packing fresh Irish strawberries in heart-shaped punnets, and sold in supermarkets as Mother's Day gifts.
